Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a sheet feed apparatus and an image forming apparatus having the same, and more specifically, a sheet feed apparatus that separates a sheet fed from a sheet placing tray and feeds the sheet one by one, and an image forming apparatus having the same.
Description of the Related Art
An example of a related art is disclosed in a Japanese patent application laying-open No. 2012-217147 [H04N 1/04] (Literature 1) laid-open on Nov. 8, 2012. A sheet feed apparatus disclosed in this literature 1 is a sheet feed apparatus that is applied to an image reading apparatus adopting a roller-separation system, which comprises a pickup roller for feeding a document sheet that is placed on a sheet feed tray, a sheet feed roller that is provided in a downstream side from the pickup roller in a sheet feeding direction and a separation roller for nipping the document sheet in cooperation with the sheet feed roller. In such a sheet feed apparatus, a document stacked on the tray is picked-up by the pickup roller and separated by the sheet feed roller and the separation roller one by one to be fed into a feeding path.
However, in such the sheet feed apparatus disclosed in this literature 1, since it is necessary to perform replacing work in a state where a cover of the sheet feed apparatus is opened when replacing a separation member like the separation roller, if installation structure of the separation member is complicated, it is hard to work. Therefore, there is a problem of dropping a removed component to an inside of the sheet feed apparatus at the time of the replacing work.